RallyX drivers take all sorts of different paths to find their way into the seat of a car. For some, it’s a natural transition from rally; for others, it may be from road racing, or even dirt ovals. For Connor Parise, that path came through the world of sim racing.

One of the more than 20 drivers to get behind the wheel in last month’s RallyX Americas Open Test in Orlando, Parise has made a name for himself as one of the top off-road drivers in the world on iRacing. He’s competed in multiple sim racing world championships, raced for esports teams owned by off-road stars like Travis Pastrana and Jim Beaver, and trained extensively with the sim before getting behind the wheel of the real thing—an experience he credits with dissipating his nerves right away.

“The transition from sim to reality was so seamless I sincerely felt right at home,” he said of his first run in the First Corner FC5. “I absolutely attribute that to the hundreds of laps I have run in the Crosscar on iRacing. When I got into the real car, all of that practice translated instantly.

“The key is that these cars are incredibly easy (and fun) to overdrive. The temptation is to throw it sideways, but the sim teaches you the discipline to keep it tidy and planted. I wasn’t guessing where that limit was—iRacing’s physics are so close that I could feel the rear start to yaw and instinctively knew how to maintain forward bite. I was able to stay in that peak operating window from lap one. That wasn’t luck or natural talent, it was the foundation of training that started on my simulator.”

For Parise, a fan of the sport for decades, the goal of just getting to a test day had been in his sights since he first discovered it. The open test gave him a chance to share the paddock with his heroes as a peer instead of a fan for the first time.

“As someone who has been captivated with rallycross since I first saw it at X Games in the early 2010s, it was surreal to find myself in the RallyX Americas paddock in a race suit,” he added. “While I’ve been lucky enough to have raced with many of the sport’s stars on iRacing, to do so in person as a prospective peer, not a fan, really felt like a dream coming full circle.

“Actually driving the crosscar amplified that dream by ten. The power to weight ratio of these machines is stunning, and they feel so balanced on the edge of grip. If I had been wearing an open face helmet you would have seen a huge grin plastered on my face from the moment I fired it up.”

One thing is for certain: now that he’s been in the driver’s seat once, Parise is intent on getting back behind the wheel.

“To say that I had fun would be a massive understatement,” he concluded. “This experience solidified my passion for rallycross, and I am determined to get back into one of these beasts again.”

Want your own chance at testing a RallyX Americas Hypercar, Supercar, or Crosscar? Applications are open now for our next test, coming to the Charlotte area on Thursday-Friday, March 26-27. Click here to send in your test application!